Antonie or Anton Sminck Pitloo (21 April or 8 May 1790 – 22 June 1837) was a Dutch painter. His surname was originally Pitlo, but he added the extra "o" because he was often mistaken for an Italian while resident in Italy. In Italian he is also known as Antonio van Pitloo.

Biography

Pitloo was born in

Arnhem Arnhem ( ; ; Central Dutch dialects, Ernems: ''Èrnem'') is a Cities of the Netherlands, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality situated in the eastern part of the Netherlands, near the German border. It is the capita ...

. He started studying painting first at

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

and then at

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

, where there was already an international artistic colony, in 1811. He took advantage of a scholarship offered by

Louis Bonaparte Louis Bonaparte (born Luigi Buonaparte; 2 September 1778 – 25 July 1846) was a younger brother of Napoleon, Napoleon I, Emperor of the French. He was a monarch in his own right from 1806 to 1810, ruling over the Kingdom of Holland (a French c ...

, the King of Holland. In 1815, after the fall of Bonaparte, the scholarship payments ceased. He was then invited to

Naples Naples ( ; ; ) is the Regions of Italy, regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 908,082 within the city's administrative limits as of 2025, while its Metropolitan City of N ...

by the Russian diplomat and art connoisseur Count Grigory Vladimirovich Orloff (1777 – 22 June 1826). In 1816, Pitloo won, in a public competition, the post of professor of landscape at the Neapolitan Academy. Lord Napier lauded him as a landscape painter: Antonio Pitloo - La Lanterna del Molo

In 1820 he married Giulia Mori and thus became a citizen of the

Kingdom of the Two Sicilies The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies () was a kingdom in Southern Italy from 1816 to 1861 under the control of the House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies, a cadet branch of the House of Bourbon, Bourbons. The kingdom was the largest sovereign state by popula ...

. He became a lecturer at the Art Institute of Art at Naples where he specialized in pastoral painting. Around 1826 he was living in Vicoletto del Vasto 15, with Carl Götzloff, Giacinto Gigante and Teodoro Duclere. Gabriele Smargiassi was his pupil and successor at the academy. Another pupil was Vincenzo Franceschini. He remained in Naples until his death during a

cholera Cholera () is an infection of the small intestine by some Strain (biology), strains of the Bacteria, bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea last ...

epidemic. He was buried in the English Cemetery there. Pitloo

He was considered a leading exponent of the " Posillipo School" of painting, named to the area where he lived in Naples. His paintings have been compared to precursors of

Impressionism Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

, some sixty years before this was invented.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pitloo, Antonie Sminck 1790 births 1837 deaths 19th-century Dutch painters Dutch male painters Dutch engravers Italian vedutisti Dutch landscape painters Artists from Arnhem Deaths from cholera Academic staff of the Accademia di Belle Arti di Napoli 19th-century Neapolitan people 19th-century Dutch male artists